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Mobilegeddon: Impact of Google’s Mobile Friendly Update

finally rolled out on 21st of April 2015. Marketers and users using SEO to drive traffic surely know the hype of the build-up to the algorithm update predicted to impact more sites than Panda and Penguin algorithms’.

Web sites which aren’t optimized for mobile’s smaller screens Google’s algorithm downgrade the rank of those sites in the search result. The changes only affect a site’s search ranking on mobile devices and it only applies to individual pages, not entire websites. It only impacts searches done on Smartphone, not tablets and Desktops.

This update forced website owners to make their website work better and friendlier on mobile devices. According to Google, in order to be a considered mobile-friendly site, its text has to be readable without tapping and zooming and its tap targets need to be spaced out appropriately.

So, it’s been four months since the launch of Google’s Mobile Friendly Algorithm.

See how it is impacting the world of websites:

The Update impacted the mobile SEO, many sites experienced a significant drop in mobile rankings while Desktop SEO remained relatively stable (or even growing their visibility), suggesting that the change in visibility was due to the mobile friendly update.

Bright Edge Content marketing company has tracked over 20,000 URLs since the update and is reported a 21% decrease in non-mobile-friendly URLs on the first 3 pages of search results. While page 1 results have only seen a 17.3% decrease, the impact is more significant on pages 2-3.

Visiting these sites via a mobile browser shows that page speed and load time seems to be a heavier weighted ranking factor over this new mobile-friendly update. With responsive sites, you have a heavier code base and can inherently have a slower load time while still passing Google’s Mobile Friendly Test.

A slight increase in the percentage of page 1 is shown on the mobile-friendly results, the impact has clearly been less significant than many predicted. Mobilegeddon was Overhyped and Unhelpful.

It will be over-enthusiastic to assume that your website isn’t affected. If you believe you were affected by the aftermath of Mobilegeddon, there are a few measures you can take:-

Mobile audit. Google have made free tools available to site owners and webmasters. You can easily run your site through their Mobile-Friendly Test tool to see where you stand.

Analyze traffic. The second thing to do is to look at your analytics and review traffic numbers. Specifically hone in on the week leading up to April 21 and the week after.

Invest in responsive. If you’re still unsure of whether you were affected or not, it’s a good idea to go ahead and invest in responsive design. This will eliminate any worry and will both please Google and your end users.

In the end, brand awareness will increase organic traffic–and there’s not much Google can do about that. So, stop worrying and you can get back to focusing on your business and building a quality brand.